Two prominent Republican lawmakers are seeking interviews with current and former top US Securities and Exchange Commission officials about any Biden administration involvement in European Union environmental, social and governance directives.
(Bloomberg) — Two prominent Republican lawmakers are seeking interviews with current and former top US Securities and Exchange Commission officials about any Biden administration involvement in European Union environmental, social and governance directives.
Tim Scott, the top Republican on the Senate Banking Committee, and House Oversight Chairman James Comer, in letters to the officials on Monday, expressed concern that agencies are “either passively allowing a foreign entity to regulate US companies or willfully circumventing the US regulatory process.”
The letters include a request to SEC Chairman Gary Gensler for interviews of Chief of Staff Amanda Fischer, SEC Climate Counsel Mika Morse and others. Other letters seek transcribed interviews from former Acting SEC Chair Allison Lee and former SEC chief of staff Prashant Yerramalli.
A White House spokeswoman referred a request for comment to the SEC, which did not immediately provide a response to the Scott and Comer letters.
Scott, the junior senator from South Carolina and a 2024 Republican presidential candidate, and Comer, a Kentucky Republican, write in their letters that climate directives being advanced by the EU could have significant effects on American companies, and they’re worried that regulatory responsibility is being “ceded” to foreign regulators.
“Shifting to an EU style climate regulatory regime in the US would materially and unnecessarily harm our nation’s oil and gas sector, agriculture sector, and our preeminent capital markets,” Scott and Comer said.
“We believe that members of your staff have information that will assist us in fully understanding: the role and activities of the SEC in the development and promulgation of these EU directives,” they told Gensler.
Earlier: ESG Investing Goes Quiet After Republican Attacks
The two lawmakers contend it would be “an alarming development and a significant deviation from historical practices” if it were found that a US agency coordinated with “any such efforts “to advance the EU’s ESG agenda over the interests of the US and American companies.”
Each of the officials are being asked to contact Comer’s committee by July 25 to arrange for interviews.
After being championed by many business executives, sustainable investing has come under increasing attack from Republicans in Congress, state capitols and on the presidential campaign trail.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, another Republican presidential candidate, signed a bill in May barring the use of ESG when investing public money.
Letters that Scott and Comer sent to Gensler and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen in early June made similar inquiries regarding the Biden administration and ESG policy.
At the time, an SEC spokeswoman said Gensler “would respond to members of Congress directly, rather than through the media.”
(Updates with information on the letters in the third paragraph. An earlier version of the story corrected who was requested for testimony)
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